


dream a little dream of me

by hunterwho



Category: Half-Life VR But The AI Is Self Aware
Genre: Friends to Lovers, M/M, Nightmares, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Sharing a Bed, benrey denies his feelings asmr, gordon freeman is traumatized, my god... these bitches gay!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-14
Updated: 2020-11-17
Packaged: 2021-03-10 01:41:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27566185
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hunterwho/pseuds/hunterwho
Summary: Benrey has a mystery to solve, a mission to complete: figure out why Gordon’s having nightmares, and figure out why he of all people is part of them.
Relationships: Benrey & Tommy Coolatta & Gordon Freeman, Benrey/Gordon Freeman, Benrey/Tommy Coolatta, Tommy Coolatta/Gordon Freeman
Comments: 11
Kudos: 121





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> yo! this is my first hlvrai fic but it's been in the works for a while. i like these Dumb Gaming Men a lot and i think they are very fun to write. by the way, the characters/relationships in the tags are for future chapters!

The first time Benrey notices, he feels like he’s going to be sick.

He’s up late for a gaming session on his (Gordon’s, technically) Switch, and when he finally turns off the TV it’s well past two in the morning. He’s about to just grab a glass of water and get to sleep on the couch when he hears noise from Gordon’s room, and his curiosity gets the better of him. 

When he tentatively eases the door to Gordon’s bedroom open, the first thing he hears is a muffled whimper, and his eyes flick over to the bed, alarmed. Gordon’s breathing is quick and uneven, and he’s too tense, shoulders drawn to his ears, his left hand in a death grip around his right wrist, scrambling for a gun arm that he hasn’t had in months. He’s trembling. A nightmare, Benrey thinks, and normally that’d be okay. Except it really isn’t, because as Benrey’s leaving he swears he hears Gordon say his name. And when he pauses in the doorway, he hears it again.

“Benrey, Benrey, god, no, please.”

Something twists in Benrey’s gut and he quickly backs away, shutting the door behind him. He can’t sleep for a while after that, his mind playing Gordon’s frantic, pained pleas over and over until he drowns them out with ASMR and lo-fi.

The following morning, Benrey’s greeted with a steaming mug of black coffee on the table in front of him. When he pushes himself up to look around, he sees Gordon, heavy bags under his eyes, taking his morning meds with a coffee mug of his own. Judging from Freeman’s weird habit of forcing himself to get up no later than eight a.m, he guesses it couldn’t have been more than four hours since he fell asleep last. This is fine.

“morning, feetman.”

“Morning, Benrey. Sorry, did I wake you up? I know you were up late last night doing god-knows-what, and I wouldn’t want you to miss out on your beauty sleep.” His tone is prickly, but not more than any other morning. Either he doesn’t remember his nightmare from last night or this happens often enough that it doesn’t change Gordon’s behavior, and Benrey doesn’t know which one he’s hoping is true.

“nah, actually, i checked out kinda early last night. told the squad i had to go worship the hot feet of my gamer husband, they were chill with it.” Benrey punctuates his sentence by sticking one of his feet off the couch, pointing it at Gordon and wiggling his toes with a smirk.

“Jesus, dude, that’s disgusting! Fucking stop calling me your ‘gamer husband’, and fucking  _ stop _ with the foot fetish stuff! I swear to God, one of these days I should just kick you off my couch.”

“noo, you could never do that, you caaare m- um. you, uh, killed me and shit, so now you owe me, and you have to care me for the rest of eternity. sucks.”

“Good thing you remind me why I put up with you. Don’t know how I’d ever remember otherwise,” Gordon grumbles, rolling his eyes and taking a long drink of coffee.

The rest of the day is as usual. Gordon digs his laptop out from under the mounds of mail he’s received post-incident, checks his email, works on his write-up of the situation. Benrey plays whatever game he wants to at the moment- today it’s Animal Crossing, mostly so he can get Gordon to freak out by harassing their villagers with his net- and they just... kind of... exist. Together. It was weird for a while, at the beginning, but it’s become routine, and routine is nice for both of them. Gordon heads to bed around eleven p.m, as always, and Benrey stays up playing video games, and eventually he conks out on the couch, so they can wake up and do it all over again. 

But now, Benrey has a mystery to solve, a mission to complete: figure out why Gordon’s having nightmares, and figure out why he of all people is part of them.

On a surface level, the answer to both questions is simple:  _ Black Mesa. _ Clearly, Freeman’s got some undiagnosed, untreated brainworms about it, and obviously, he was there when that got fucked up, so he’d be there in the nightmares, too. Explains the gun-hand posturing, at least. But if he was reliving the boss battle in his dreams every night, how was he so calm (well, calm for Gordon, at least) when talking to Benrey during the day, as roommates? And, furthermore, if he  _ was _ reliving the Big Bad Final Battle, why did he sound so distressed while calling his name?

More research was needed, clearly, and Benrey didn’t feel bad at all about spying on his roommate. He did watch him sleep sometimes back in Black Mesa, after all; the rise and fall of the orange HEV suit was a calming rhythm, and the deep sigh of his breathing had lulled Benrey to sleep many nights. Not in, like, a weird way or anything, though.

When he opens the door to Gordon’s room, he’s sleeping peacefully. 

But Benrey sits in the armchair in the corner and watches for hours. He sees his hackles raise, hears his whimpers and notes the way his hands tremble as he digs the fingernails of his left hand into his right wrist. It makes him mad for reasons he can’t quite understand, mad enough to retreat to the couch and spend hours playing Mario Kart to stop himself from following those facts to their logical conclusions.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Benrey caves a bit, despite his best intentions.

Benrey’s almost mad at how normal Gordon acts the following morning. He’s the same nonchalant conversation partner he always is, acts the same way when Benrey chases Katt around with an axe, still won’t give up on his official report to the governmental powers-that-be in order to come play some fun games with best friend Benrey, even though he has as long as he wants to finish it, and the government still has to send him a hefty paycheck in the mail every month to keep quiet about the ordeal until the official press release.

It’s alright, though, because even though Gordon’s a boring science man who doesn’t seem to understand the concept of not having to work to get money, he’s still a great roommate. He makes them dinner (which is probably for the best, considering Benrey can’t make soup without permanently melding it to the bottom of the pan and forcing them to toss it), and he lets Benrey stay on the couch, and they stay out of each other’s hair, mostly. Plus, he doesn’t use up all the hot water, and he has his own washer and dryer, which is, like, the best. Anyway, Benrey’s pissed, because Gordon can’t just have terrifying nightmares about the trauma he went through where he _says his name_ and then wake up and act like nothing’s happened. It isn’t fucking fair, and it makes the mystery way harder to solve.

It’s the third night in a row that Benrey’s snuck into Gordon’s room without his knowledge to watch him sleep. For any other roommate, this might be a little weird, but it’s just Gordon, so it’s alright. Plus, Benrey needs to figure out what the deal is here, and keeping an eye on Gordon was basically his job for a while; he has experience. Just like the night before, Gordon’s previously peaceful sleeping form seizes with tension and starts twitching and shuddering after just an hour or so. He talks more tonight, though, which is good. More data points, to form a stronger hypothesis.

“Benrey, please, don’t leave. Mm, don’t, want you to go, you’ll… hurt, out there. Come back, ‘ry, please,” Gordon mumbles, left hand gripping his bedsheets tightly. Benrey’s heart hurts, and he feels a lump building in his throat. When he tries to let out the Sweet Voice, all that comes out is a pained sound somewhere between a whine and a sob. It doesn’t get rid of the lump in his throat. 

Gordon shifts in bed, and Benrey abruptly realizes that maybe that was a little bit loud, and Gordon’s not the heaviest sleeper, and he’s back in the living room on the couch before Gordon’s finished rubbing the sleep from his eyes.

The next morning’s a _little_ different, at least. Gordon puts cream and sugar in his coffee this time, and makes some scrambled eggs with cheese for breakfast. When they have their usual bickering discussion over morning breakfast, Gordon brings up the fact that he thought he heard something in the middle of the night last night, and Benrey brushes it off with a “yeah, dude, got an insane killstreak in halo last night, you shoulda seen it but you were too busy sleeping like a little bitch.” Gordon doesn’t press the issue, even though some part of Benrey wishes he had.

That night, after Gordon returns from his grocery run, he unveils a special surprise present he’d gotten them for their one-month anniversary of their escape from Hell-on-Earth: a bottle of wine. Even though Benrey literally has never seen a wine bottle before in living memory, the way Gordon presents it as a special affair tells him it’s probably pretty important (and also probably pretty expensive), and he’s more than willing to go along.

After dinner, they uncork it and pour themselves each a glass, and then a little more, and then Gordon agrees to play some Mario Kart, which is when Benrey knows he’s pretty decently shitfaced. Even drunk, Benrey still beats Gordon easily, and cackles when he passes the finish line well ahead of the other racers. Benrey’s win makes Gordon forget he still has to finish the race, too, and he chooses instead to flop his body over Benrey’s on the couch, complaining that it wasn’t fair, Benrey had way more practice than him at it, and he just picked a bad kart, he’d do better next time. Benrey, honestly, could not care less about the race at this point, because right now Gordon was basically laying on him. The pressure of his chest, the thump-ump of his heartbeat, and the way his breath tickled his face meant Benrey did not feel capable of coherent thought or Mario Kart. He was fairly sure he was blushing, but if Gordon wanted to know he could blame it on the alcohol.

When Benrey wakes again, it’s still dark outside. He blearily checks his phone to find out that it’s just past one in the morning, and realizes he _really_ needs to piss. After taking care of that (and drinking a glass of water, in preparation for the headache he’d almost certainly have tomorrow morning), he’s on his way back to the couch when he notices Gordon’s door, open a crack, and remembers- the experiment, he needs to check on him. Needs to watch him, to- take care of him, maybe. Has to, uh, y’know. Revive a fallen teammate. 

So despite the couch calling him back for some much-needed sleep, Benrey steals into Gordon’s room, seats himself in his armchair, and watches as he cries out for help, for _him._

“Please, Benrey, I’m so alone, don’t go… can’t leave you behind, you’re my friend, please, no! No!” Gordon, still asleep, sobs into his pillow, and Benrey only notices he’s crying when he stops to grab a tissue from the kitchen to dry his eyes.

Despite his best efforts, Benrey can’t get to sleep the following night. Nor is he brave enough to go back to Gordon’s room, too scared of what he might hear, what he might see, what he might _do._ So he tries to listen to his lo-fi, tries playing every game he owns, but none of it feels good, and none of it distracts his traitor brain from what he heard, from what he keeps replaying in his head- that Gordon considers him a friend.

(That Gordon doesn’t want him to go, that Gordon feels so alone without him there, that Gordon cares for him and needs his help and he’s being such a coward, such a fool, to turn his back on him when he calls out his name.)

He puts the pieces together in his head, that night. He stays up late, thinking and waiting in turns, for Gordon’s voice to call out for him, and by the time he hears it, he’s already off the couch and headed down the hall to his room. This time, he _isn’t_ gonna leave. He’s gonna _be_ there.

It’s the same scene as always: Gordon, in bed, hair down and draped over his pillow, shaking as he calls out weakly for help, gripping his former gun-arm in an attempt at self-defense. Benrey summons all the courage he can muster, and approaches his bed, eventually taking a seat on the edge. He hovers there for a moment, uncertain of his next step, but takes a deep, shuddery breath and moves his hand to rest lightly on Gordon’s shoulder. With the most incremental force he has, he pushes it down, rubbing his neck lightly as he relieves the tension stored there bit by bit. Once his shoulders loosen, he moves to Gordon’s arms, interlacing his own fingers with Gordon’s right hand and brushing across the base of his thumb as he pries his left hand out of its death grip. He then moves to Gordon’s back, rubbing down his spine with his fingertips, pressing lightly every few inches. His entire body visibly relaxes, the nervous energy in his muscles dissipating as his whimpers give way to sighs. Benrey repeats the motion with his whole hand touching Gordon’s back, using his thumb to smooth out any still-tense areas of his shoulder blades, and lingering at the base of his spine for just a moment longer than he needs to. 

That, of course, is Benrey’s fatal mistake: he lets himself enjoy it, too.

“i’m here, gordon,” he says, in a low, calm voice.

Gordon’s eyes fly open, and he replies, “Benrey, what the absolute _fuck_ are you doing in my bedroom?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> frenrey fic..... 2! (peggle 2 gif)  
> i love leaving things on cliffhangers! like and subscribe if you like cliffhangers too, and don't forget to ding that bell. leave a comment. whatever it is you do on archive of our own
> 
> legitimate author's note: i have maybe... three or four chapters still that are pre-written, and after that i'm gonna need to start writing this again, which might take a while (school and surgery recovery are hard). until then, updates should be decently consistent at a rate of maybe one chapter per week? (provided i check my ao3 account.) no promises on specific upload dates & times or anything, but i love this fic and i love writing it, so we will see if i can continue updating it regularly!!

**Author's Note:**

> will upload more chapters when my evil evil brain lets me. in the meantime feel free to leave a like and subscribe for more exceptional writings!


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